Targeted

They now say of Rodrigo Duterte that he was the best loved President the country never had.

Until literally the last minute last Friday, supporters milled around the Comelec head office in Intramuros hoping their preferred candidate would make an appearance, certificate of candidacy in hand. Some of them kept vigil the night before so that their reluctant candidate, should he appear, would not be in want of a merry mob.

When photos of his daughter Sarah Duterte having her head shaved circulated on social media, supporters had their heads shaved as well. It was a desperate effort to get their candidate to run.

Although Duterte repeatedly insisted he was not seeking the presidency, 15 percent of voters cited him as their candidate of choice. That put him within striking distance of personalities spending all their waking hours wooing votes.

Duterte’s non-candidacy is a phenomenon on its own. This has never happened before: a presidential candidate by pubic demand.

In the public imagination, he loomed large. He was the valiant knight who would slay the many dragons that bedevil our nation. He was the antidote to the epidemic of drugs that eats away the social fabric. He was the perfect antidote to the lackadaisical, lying and lazy leadership we endured – and which seeks to perpetuate itself by means of a clone.

Duterte, candidate by acclamation, enjoyed support that was wide and passionate. The nation needed a redeemer and he was that. Although unwarranted by evidence, his supporters were soon swept up by their own fiction, consumed by their own unfounded hopes.

If Duterte was a storm, he quickly dissipated. The man, aware of his own frailties, would not assume the burden he knew he could not bear. He would not be an opportunist exploiting an illusion that happens to have caught fire.

In that he is wise.

The presidency ought to be the burden of the whole nation, not of one man. If others similarly unqualified have sought and won the presidency before, precedence does not justify continuing the pattern.

The Duterte phenomenon, and its abrupt termination, tells us this: it is really time to trash the presidential form of government. It intoxicates our people, makes them believe in White Knights and other similar forms of political superstition. Instead of dealing with our systemic and cultural frailties, we constantly seek supermen to redeem us.

Duterte simply refuses to be the opiate of the people. Let other be that – at our own collective peril.

Alas, even as he insisted he was not seeking the presidency, his snowballing popularity put Duterte on the radar screen. He was targeted for demolition by the Liberal Party, whose idea of electoral strategy is to slash and burn all other political options and leave the electorate with no one else but their own unappetizing offering.

The LP strategy is to turn our electoral democracy against itself, to convert it into a disguise for one-party rule. Bully the opposition, dish out the black propaganda, weaponize the law to serve factional interest. We have seen five years of these tactics.

Being targeted for the LP’s brand of political assassination is the only pain Duterte nurses as he walks off the stage. Being what he is, however, he will not go quietly into the night.

Accreditation

This, too, will soon break out into the open.

There appears to be a storm brewing at the LTFRB between the Board and senior management. This will have repercussions for all the public conveyances required to purchase passenger insurance before their franchises are renewed.

Currently, the LTFRB accredits two insurance consortia for the required insurance coverage. The first consortium is led by UCPB General Insurance, with the Philippine Association Management Insurance (PAMI) as managing company.  The second consortium is led by Allied Bankers Insurance Company, with SCCI Management & Insurance Agency as managing company.

The existing accreditation for the LTFRB’s Personal Passenger Accident Insurance Program (PPAIP) expires in a month. Bidding for accreditation for the 2015-18 period was scheduled last week, October 14.

The Board, however, decided to postpone the bidding to October 21. The postponement was precipitated by the Board’s discovery that the existing rules and regulations contained in the agency’s Instructions to Participants (ITP) were significantly altered by senior management.

The alterations appear to favor one consortium over the other. Left to stand, the altered rules would produce a monopoly of insurance providers. That will be injurious to the public conveyances who will be denied choices of insurance providers.

This is not a small matter. Insurance coverage for all our public transport companies is, imaginably, big business. The costs of such coverage will have an impact on the operations of the transport companies and the riding public eventually.

As a general rule, the process for accreditation ought to be as transparent and as competitive as possible. This is to ensure everything is aboveboard. We all know the hazards monopolies pose.

The purpose of accreditation is intended, of course, to ensure that all passengers are covered by reputable insurance companies ready to meet whatever claims arise. That should be the only purpose. It is never the purpose of accreditation to lock monopolies in place.

The rescheduled bidding for accreditation of insurance providers happens tomorrow, unless there is some new reason for delay. We can only hope that the LTFRB board and the agency’s senior managers have properly sorted out their differences. We can only hope the bidding will be fair and transparent.

There is much public interest at stake here.